Lord Foxbridge Butts In Read Online Free PDF Page A

handsomeness.
    “I am too old, they say,” he shrugged again, a tragic acceptance, “I have too much experience, they say. I cannot be integrated into a troupe, they say.”
    “They say quite a lot,” I tried to commiserate but didn’t really understand what he was talking about. He didn’t appear to be more than twenty-five, how could he be too old?
    “Eh, they are fools and bastards,” he did a another kind of shrug, a dismissive one. He had quite a repertoire of shrugs, “May I come over there instead of shouting at you across the yard?”
    “Of course,” I said, thinking that he was going to get dressed and come down the hall; but he simply stepped out of his window onto the narrow decorative ledge underneath; without so much as a pause to catch his balance, he tiptoed over to the gallery, which was about six feet lower than his ledge but barred three feet up with little wrought-iron balconies that he balanced on like a tightrope; he ran along the rails onto the ledge beneath my windows, and finally leaped over the sill with the gravity-defying ease of a house-cat. I was stunned.
    “Much better,” he said, stepping close to me and looking up at me seductively. He was a good deal shorter than I’d thought, the top of his head was just under my nose; he was also a good deal older than he’d appeared from a distance — little wrinkles around his eyes and mouth gave him away, he was at least thirty if not thirty-five. Even so, he was a beautiful man, and so close to me that I could feel his excitement against my leg. Of course, his excitement would have brushed my leg from halfway across the room; up close it was a little frightening.
    But I am not one to let a little fright turn me from my path. Nor, apparently, was Count Gryzynsky in any mood to brook hesitation on my part; in less time than it would have taken me to ask if he’d like a cup of coffee, he had me out of my dressing-gown and sprawled across the sofa in a most indelicate posture.
    To spare my blushes, I will regretfully draw a curtain across the scene that ensued. It was some little time before our activities devolved to a nature that a gentleman could possibly discuss outside of a brothel.
    “Would you lunch with me this afternoon, Count?” I asked when I had finally caught my breath. I wanted to keep him by me for a little while longer, at least long enough to get a repeat performance or two of that extremely enjoyable matinée , and feeding people does tend to make them stick around a bit.
    “Call me Andrzej,” he murmured into my collarbone.
    “My name is Sebastian,” I said, a little surprised that we’d skipped that basic courtesy; but then, we’d been rather busy, “Will you join me for lunch, Andrzej?”
    “I cannot, I fear,” he sighed, sitting up and looking down at me sadly, “I must go to meet an agent today. I am hoping he can give me a job.”
    “I’m sure he will,” I smiled encouragingly, “You’re absolutely ripping, I bet you’re a wonder on the stage.”
    “You are sweet,” he said with the saddest smile since Camille coughed her last, “But I am not expecting this meeting to be fruitful. I hope, but I do not expect.”
    “Golly, I wish I could help,” I tried to remember if any of my circle of acquaintance was involved in the theatre and could give Andrzej a leg-up.
    “You could give me a hundred pounds,” he said, as if it were the most negligible kind of favor, like asking for a cigarette.
    “A hundred pounds?” I gaped at him. I’d never in my life heard anybody say such a thing, and I was young enough and sheltered enough for it to shock me to the core.
    “You have a hundred pounds, do you not? You are very rich, they say.”
    “I’m... I mean... of course I have, but...” I sputtered. One simply doesn’t say such things. But then, one simply doesn’t climb across courtyards in the nude and leap into strangers’ windows, either, so I suppose it was all relative; still, I knew fellows